Blockbuster Finally Bites the Dust; All St. Louis Stores to Close

Your unborn children will never know what it means to rent a movie from Blockbuster.

Blockbuster is closing the handful of stores still open in Missouri by next year in a third and final round of cuts eliminating the video store's retail operations nationwide.

DISH Network, the owner of Blockbuster, announced Wednesday it is shuttering 300 retail stores and ending the video-by-mail service designed to compete in the age of Redbox and Netflix.

Daily RFT found seven Blockbuster stores still open in or near River City: on Chippewa Street in St. Louis; and in Webster Groves; Wentzville; Maryland Heights; Festus; Troy; and Alton, Illinois. Those and all Blockbusters will be gone by January 2014.

"This is not an easy decision, yet consumer demand is clearly moving to digital distribution of video entertainment," says Joseph P. Clayton, DISH president and chief executive officer. "Despite our closing of the physical distribution elements of the business, we continue to see value in the Blockbuster brand, and we expect to leverage that brand as we continue to expand our digital offerings."

Blockbuster closed 10 of Missouri's 26 locations in February 2012, including stores in St. Ann and O'Fallon, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. A year later, the company closed 300 locations nationwide, cutting 3,000 jobs, according to the St. Louis Business Journal, leaving 14 stores in the St. Louis metro area.

As much as I like rental stores I'm glad Blockbuster is going. Not happy for people losing their jobs but have had problems with the company for years. Kept getting my account mixed up with someone else and froze mine while showing the other guys' name on it (this was while showing them my card with my name). Tried to take care of it but finally said screw them.